2007

The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 18.0753 Tuesday, 6 November 2007
[1] From: Lysbeth Benkert-Rasmussen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 1 Nov 2007 14:39:22 -0500
Subj: RE: SHK 18.0743 Problem Shrews
[2] From: Jack Heller <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Nov 2007 15:53:20 -0400 (EDT)
Subj: Re: SHK 18.0743 Problem Shrews
[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Lysbeth Benkert-Rasmussen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 1 Nov 2007 14:39:22 -0500
Subject: 18.0743 Problem Shrews
Comment: RE: SHK 18.0743 Problem Shrews
Anna Kamaralli begins her post by saying, "People who think it's the
height of comedy to watch an "obnoxious bitch" get "what she deserves"
have never had a problem with the play in the first place. The problem
arises for those who hope that the play might have more to offer than
castration anxiety-propelled wish-fulfillment. Shakespeare's plays are
almost always sympathetic to being read in a way that supports the
status quo, or in a way that subverts it."
I am hoping that my post did not imply that I see Kate as the bitch who
gets what she deserves. This is not what I meant to say.
Based on the interactions we see between Kate, her sister and her father
at the start of the play, Katherine is characterized as someone who
deeply mistrusts and is contemptuous of her hypocritical sister, the men
who fawn over her, and her father (who she seems to think is
deliberately blind to how Bianca manipulates him). The lines even in
this short scene indicate a complexly imagined character.
These emotions necessarily color her interactions with all men
(Petruccio included). She is, at this point in the play, incapable of
entering into an equal partnership in a marriage-you cannot have a
partnership if you cannot trust. All of this is fully supported by the
text.
I would argue that Petruccio is equally unable to enter into a fully
equal partnership when he first meets Kate. He is emotionally immature.
However, there is evidence that he is more bluster than bite-no
servant deliberately teases his master into a brawl in the middle of the
street unless he has known his master for a long time and trusts him not
to fire him. Petruccio's main problem is that he can be manipulated by
others-his servant for one, but also his "friend" who somehow manages to
back him into proposing to Kate (in what seems to be a sixteenth-century
version of "I dare you-no, I double dare you-no, I triple dog dare
you!"). Again, as I read these interactions, I do not see flat
characters; they are believable representations. I, myself, have
watched some men do some very stupid things just because they started
bragging and didn't know how to back themselves out. Yes, it's
immature. That's the point-Petruccio is immature.
A good production will show how the two characters learn about what it
means to work in a partnership, to trust one another. I think that's
what the San Francisco production did, and did it just as successfully
as it portrayed the more farcical aspects of the comedy.
Even as I will argue for these complex characters, however, I will still
maintain that because Katherine threw the first punch (she both insults
him and slaps him at the start of their first scene together, while he
resolutely refuses to return her insults), that the audience's
sympathies can be more easily engaged for Petruccio. The director,
however, still has to make sure that the viewers never have to worry
about her safety. If there is violence, it has to be "cartoon
violence." Otherwise, it's just not funny.
I think you can do them both -- have your farce and your characters, too.
Lysbeth
[2]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Jack Heller <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 3 Nov 2007 15:53:20 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: 18.0743 Problem Shrews
Comment: Re: SHK 18.0743 Problem Shrews
Perhaps one approach to the Shrew question is to note the number of
plays generated on the subject, some clearly in direct response to
Shakespeare's play Shakespeare's play itself motivated in part for the
anonymous TAMING OF A SHREW. (I haven't yet been persuaded that A SHREW
is an early Shakespeare version of THE SHREW.) So what plays would I
examine together?
These at least:
TAMING OF A SHREW, anonymous
TAMING OF THE SHREW, Shakespeare
THE TAMER TAMED, John Fletcher (and Beaumont?)
EPICOENE OR THE SILENT WOMAN, Ben Jonson
THE ROARING GIRL, Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton
Jack Heller
Huntington University
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